FIELD HYGIENE

AND SANITATION

Prepared by:
SGT XENIA MARIE RAZALO LAWAN PAFR

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 Key Terms

Hygiene-conditions or practices
conducive to maintaining health and
preventing disease, especially through
cleanliness.
Sanitation-conditions relating to
public health, especially the provision
of clean drinking water and adequate
sewage disposal.

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 Hygiene and Behavior
• Hygiene is a key factor in reducing risk of diarrheal and
other sanitation-related diseases
• People and communities can protect themselves from
diarrhea and other infectious diseases they make
changes in hygiene behavior
• Making behavior changes requires actions
• These behavior change actions will occur only if people
are informed

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Hygiene Promotion: One of the Big Five to Reduce
Diarrheal Disease

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 Field Hygiene
• Techniques for living in the field to keep your body and the
environment healthy
• Campsite living
• Waste
• Sanitation
• Personal hygiene
• Environmental protection

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 Human Waste
• If setting up a base camp for any duration, it
is best to see if portable toilets can be
brought in

• In more remote camps or while traveling

on search sorties into remote areas,
other means will have to be prepared for
– Cat hole latrines
– Trench latrines
– Bucket latrines
– Alternatives

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 Alternatives for Base Camp

Portable toilet kit with snap on lid-

Inflate-a-potty

Coleman portable toilet

Bag for sanitary disposal of urine/vomit.

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 Hand Washing
• Keep 200 feet away from streams and other water
areas
• Use biodegradable soap if possible
• Consider sanitizing towellettes or wipes
• Clean your hands after toilet use, before eating or
preparing food, etc.

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 Hygiene: The Importance and Impact of
Handwashing
• Handwashing with
soap and water
after contact with
fecal material can
reduce diarrheal
diseases by 42%%
or more
• Curtis, V and S. Cairncross
(2003) Effect of washing hands
with soap on diarrhoea risk in
the community: a systematic
review. Lancet Infect Dis. 2003
May;3(5):275-81.

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 Washing Hands

• One of the most effective behaviors to prevent diarrhoea,

roundworm and whipworm.
• Rarely done at the most crucial times and rarely done most
effectively (with soap). (Is soap really needed?)
• Hands get most dangerously contaminated fron human faces
and soil (possibly containing worm eggs).

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 Cleaning fingernails
• Closely related to handwashing.
• Handwashing does not ensure fingernails get cleaned
• Clean fingernails are particularly important when food is
consumed or fed to infants using fingers
• Clean fingernails have an aesthetic value
• Handwashing and cleaning fingernails also play a role in
the prevention of eye and skin infections, such as
scabies.
• When wiping infected eyes or scratching itching infected
skin, bacteria or mites can settle on fingers and hence
be transmitted.

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 Washing the body (bathing)
• Important for preventing skin infections like
scabies (caused by small mites living under the
skin), and ringworm (a fungal infection).
• Also louse-borne typhus and louse-borne
relapsing fever are controlled with regular
washing of the body and clothes.
• Washing is best done using running water and
soap
• Special attention needs to go to folds of the skin as
well as to skin between fingers and toes.
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 Washing the
• Has an important role in the prevention of eye-
face
infections
• Hygiene related eye infections are conjunctivitis and
trachoma
• More frequent washing of the face and few flies sitting
on eyes reduces the incidence of trachoma
• Washing the face regularly removes infectious
discharge from the eyes.
• This prevents flies from being attracted to the infected
eyes, thus becoming transmission agents.
• Removing eye discharge using bare fingers or a cloth,
causes bacteria to be picked up on the fingers or cloth
and transmitted to anything else that they touch.
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 Washing clothes and bedding
• Major preventive measures to reduce
transmission of scabies and louse-borne typhus
and relapsing fever.
• Touching clothes or bedclothes of a person
infected with scabies or ringworm can easily
cause spread and further infection of others
• Lice, which may spread typhus or relapsing fever,
hide in seams of clothes and bedclothes
• Washing removes them
• Communal use of clothes and bedclothes should be
avoided
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 Introduction and Issues
• The most important lesson learned from water
and sanitation programmes:
• water and sanitation facilities on their own do not result
in improved health.
• Access to improved facilities is crucial, but…
• Correct use of water and sanitation facilities is what
leads to a reduction in disease
• Correct use requires personal, community and
institutional actions
• actions depend on behaviors

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 Waste Water
• Waste water can be ran off into an area
where it won’t be tracked into mud
• Wash water from cooking/eating clean
up should have any food particles
removed before dispersing to prevent
attraction of animals and insects
• Small pans of water can be dumped in a
secluded spot or thrown and dispersed
away from the camp area
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 Trash
• Campsite cleanliness is important
• Environmental considerations
– Leave no trace camping
• Attraction of insects and pests
• Attraction of animals
• Pack out what you pack in
• Paper trash may burn if you have a campfire,
but many plastics, foam, foil wrappers, etc.
only melt or partially burn- pack them out
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 Trash
• Campsite cleanliness is important
• Environmental considerations
– Leave no trace camping
• Attraction of insects and pests
• Attraction of animals
• Pack out what you pack in
• Paper trash may burn if you have a campfire,
but many plastics, foam, foil wrappers, etc.
only melt or partially burn- pack them out
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 Trash Continued
• If you have a fire, you may burn out cans, MRE
food containers before putting them in the trash
to reduce attraction of insects and animals.
• Dry wet trash on the side of the fire (wet paper
towels, etc.) before burning
• Do not bury trash- animals will just dig it back
up
• Do not dump trash or waste water into latrine
holes

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 Team Level Camps
• Each member should collect and carry out
their own trash.
• Do not keep trash, food, or packs where small
animals will be attracted
– They may destroy your equipment getting to it
– They may eat your food supplies
– Skunks may do more than try to eat your food
– Risks of bites
• Don’t leave your pack out leaning against a
tree or unprotected
– The straps often absorb sweat and salt and
rodents and small animals like to chew
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 Food
• Even in non-bear country- food needs to be
secured to keep it safe from other animals and
pests.
• Don’t leave food setting about the campsite.
• Keep food from inside your tent or shelter
area unless you want to wake up with a new
animal roommate.
• In non-bear country, you can still hang it in a
tree, secure in a food locker, place in a
vehicle, etc.

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 Personal Care
• Wash face, hands, and armpits at least each
day
– If water is limited, use corn starch or rub briskly
with dry towel to remove excess oil and
perspiration
• Teeth should be cleaned daily. If no
toothbrush, use a small twig or a clean piece
of cloth on your finger
• Underwear should be changed at least twice a
week.
– If no water to wash, shake it out and air for at
least two hours
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 Personal Care Continued
• Wash feet daily and keep socks clean and dry.
• Avoid
– Wearing scented deodorants, perfume, or after-
shave… it attracts insects
– Don’t bath or launder in streams, ponds, etc with
soaps. Carry water at least 200 feet from water
source

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 Some Alternatives
8" x 8" disposable washcloths premoistened
with a gentle, no-rinse hydrating cleanser.
About $10 per package

Solar showers may be obtained from small single

units to battery powered ranging from about $8-300.

Privacy shelters for showers or toilets- about $40

Disposable tooth cleaners- about $10

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 Eating and Cooking
• Wash hands before eating or preparing food
• Make sure cooking and food utensils are clean
– Wash with biodegradable soap
– Rinse well- soap residue can make you ill
– Use boiling water when possible to rinse
• Cooking pots or pans with a non-stick surface
makes clean up easy with far less water

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 Eating and Cooking Continued
• Keep your canteens or hydration systems clean
• Follow manufacturer cleaning instructions
• Avoid drink mixtures inside canteens or hydration systems
• Keep container opening or mouth piece clean

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 Eating and Cooking
Continued
• In the backcountry, you may have to use
alternate water sources
• Assume all water you come in contact with in
the outdoors is unsafe
• Water filtration is the safest method to assure
safe water
– Use filters capable of removing dangers of bacteria and
Giardia

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 An Important Matter…
• Personal hygiene is important to keep yourself healthy.
You can’t give full attention to your mission if you
aren’t healthy
• Camp hygiene and sanitation is important for
maintaining the health of everyone
• Planning and training keeps personnel healthy and
focused on mission objectives.

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• These presentations were made by the National
Emergency Services Academy for the purpose of
advancing, refreshing, or reviewing information for
search and rescue training.

• Products shown are for illustration purposes only.

The National Emergency Services Academy, Civil
Air Patrol, or the United States Air Force does not
endorse, guarantee, or recommend any specific
company, service, business, or product.

• Presentations are designed to be used with

qualified instructors familiar with your local area.
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 Hygiene Promotion Key Principles
1. Target a small number of risk practices
2. Target specific audiences
3. Identify the motives for changed behavior
4. Hygiene messages need to be positive
5. Identify appropriate channels of communication
6. Decide on a cost-effective mix of channels
7. Hygiene promotion needs to be carefully
planned, executed, monitored and evaluated.

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QUESTIONS?

THINK SAFETY!

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